Scenic Drive | Zion National Park via State Route 9

This entry is part of our Summer 2013 Boulder Utah Getaway series of posts.

For our Summer 2013 Boulder Utah Getaway, we agreed that the journey was just as important as the destination. So on Wednesday morning, en route to Boulder Utah from Mesquite, Nevada, we elected to drive through Zion National Park via SR-9 instead of bowing south on SR-389. The verdict: one of the most scenic drives I’ve ever been seen in my life.

Generally speaking, dogs are not allowed on National Forest land. With exception of one trail, Zion is no different. We didn’t stop in Zion for any resting, walking, exploring, hiking, climbing, rappelling, swimming, rock climbing, or anything else. We were simply driving through. And that’s okay.

Here are a few photos from Wednesday, August 14, 2013, roughly between 10:30 AM and 11:30 AM:

Entering Zion National Park from Springdale. Eastbound on State Route 9.

A couple more shots from the road.

Shots from the iPhone along the switchbacks near the Canyon Overlook Trail.

Last iPhone shot in the morning light.

View of the hills along Highway 9.

Following an RV. Kinda takes away from the scenery…

…so we keep looking up. View here of Checkerboard Mesa.

Beautiful sandstone.

Another view of Checkerboard Mesa.

A pine tree coming out of the sandstone.

A view of Checkerboard Mesa. Checkerboard Mesa is an example of two weathering processes, one controlled by stratigraphy and one by climate. The “checkerboard” results from the roughly perpendicular sets of grooves in the Navajo Sandstone. The nearly horizontal grooves follow layers of coarse sand that coincide with eolian bedding sets whereas the vertical grooves have been interpreted to be the result of local expansion and contraction of the rock surface due to changes in temperature and moisture (Biek et al. 2000). So in a nutshell, lines going sideways are the layers developed over time, and the lines going up and down are a result of cracks in the sandstone that have been weathered over time.